I don't understand the question and I won't respond to it.

And Bacon Is A Pig’s Best Friend

The stupid black people who are always bitching about slavery obviously don’t understand that it was a good thing because it brought us to America where we became Christian and were helped out by a bunch of really nice white people who were much nicer than our brothers in Africa who sold us into slavery.

Tell me of another country where a black kid from the hood who uses deplorable English and profane language, who demeans women, who calls for violence against the police, and who wears his pants down below his butt and raps about how racist America sucks for blacks can become a gazillionaire, critically acclaimed by sycophant whites in the music industry.”

Posted too soon but was going to add: I fucking hate arguments like this, it sounds way too muck like the whole “white mans burden” thing straight out of Kipling. See also “civilizing” the American Indian.

And obviously the patriotic thing to do is vote all the people who call you “nigger” behind your back and would like to dismantle the laws which have ameliorated the effects of slavery, segregation and prejudice in gratitude.

These people who make this argument that African-Americans descended from enslaved persons should be thankful because they are better off here in America today than in Africa never seem to want to acknowledge that the European demand for slavery made Africa a terrible place for Africans. In other words, no slave trade, and African villagers don’t have to worry that warriors from a neighboring African kingdom won’t snatch them in a raid to sell to the Europeans.

Second, if the slave trade never existed, today’s African-Americans would not have been born anyway.

These people who make this argument that African-Americans descended from enslaved persons should be thankful because they are better off here in America today than in Africa never seem to want to acknowledge that the European demand for slavery made Africa a terrible place for Africans

Not to mention the legacy of colonization and the continued strip-mining of the continent for it’s material wealth.

Why can’t the Congolese thank DeBeers for taking their shiny rocks off their hands?

it always seems as if they miss out on the opportunity to point out the first class accommodations that the Africans had on the way over here. I mean when they decide to dip their toes into these waters, they are alway quick to mention the three squares, burlap bags and a roof we didn’t have to “pay” for, and that most of the slaveowners were “good men” and “treated their slaves well”, but they rarely, if ever, bring up the luxury cruise liners that brought us across the oceans. Are they just holding that as a trump card?

Tell me of another country where a black kid from the hood who uses deplorable English and profane language, who demeans women, who calls for violence against the police, and who wears his pants down below his butt and raps about how racist America sucks for blacks can become a gazillionaire

“Tell me of another country where a black kid from the hood who uses deplorable English and profane language, who demeans women, who calls for violence against the police, and who wears his pants down below his butt and raps about how racist America sucks for blacks can become a gazillionaire”

Is he accidentally admitting that there are less than honorable ways to get rich (or die tryin’) in America? Mightn’t he get kicked off the American Stinker plantation for this blasphemy? That is, if his editors(!) actually read his scribblings.

Is he accidentally admitting that there are less than honorable ways to get rich (or die tryin’) in America?

Apropos of nothing, BITCH TOOK MY SKULL

Mightn’t he get kicked off the American Stinker plantation for this blasphemy? That is, if his editors(!) actually read his scribblings.

That would be race-mixing, and we all know how the Founding Fathers felt about that.

To respond to his original point: of course blacks can’t be patriotic. That bastard (illegitimacy!!) Frederick Douglass talked like he wasn’t even a citizen of the United States, which in its infinite mercy had both delivered him from and delivered him into bondage. “What to a slave is the Fourth of July” indeed.

I fucking hate arguments like this, it sounds way too muck like the whole “white mans burden” thing straight out of Kipling.

SOUNDS?

The simplest point to all this is this is just the same patronizing, colonialist uplift bullshit spoken by hundreds, if not thousands, of invasive, occupying, parasitic assholes throughout the ages. That if it weren’t for them, why, we’d all be living in grass huts, naked, confused by the world, and victim to those who would’ve destroyed us in our innocence…

Not them, of course, but those other people. Sometimes it’s another invasive colonialist shitbag (like the French), but other times its our fellow oppressed, being convinced to destroy us so they can profit and maybe the invasive shitbags won’t destroy them in exchange.

Because that was ultimately how the slave trade scam worked out for Africa. If you don’t throw some other tribe in chins, we throw you in chains and ship you over to be treated like cattle. So go do the same to someone else. You probably hate one of the other tribes, right? There you go. You or them, it doesn’t matter to us.

The pathetic part being that now, years later, apologists treat that as if the invasive shitbags in charge of the slave trade simply had no choice but to accept, and really, it was all the fault of the enslaving African tribes, who enslaved other tribes for no explicable reason. Even then, pinning it on the middleman was par for the course.

These people who make this argument that African-Americans descended from enslaved persons should be thankful because they are better off here in America today than in Africa never seem to want to acknowledge that the European demand for slavery made Africa a terrible place for Africans. In other words, no slave trade, and African villagers don’t have to worry that warriors from a neighboring African kingdom won’t snatch them in a raid to sell to the Europeans.

They also don’t seem interested in acknowledging that the reason Africa is so fucked up today is in huge part thanks to a hundred years of colonial rule by the white people in Europe, followed by a half-century of neocolonialism where for all intents and purposes the Euros (and us, and now the Chinese) still ran the place, just through intelligence agencies and friendly dictators instead of overt occupation.

The notion that Africa proves that black self-rule is worse than benevolent, enlightened white rule is convenient, but bullshit.

Gotta love how your Uncle Tom types will allow wingnutteria to say things it can’t otherwise say in public: imagine a white racist saying, openly, that black people are intrinsically unpatriotic because they’re so ungrateful about all America did for them. Sure, they’ll mutter meaningfully about staying on the Democrat Party plantation and whine about how black voters refuse to vote for Lincoln on the sole account of he died in 1865, but they can’t just come out and say “Real Americans are white Americans!” and not even try to equivocate.

Like, wait for Dan Blatt to come out in favor of gay concentration camps. (Suggested “unique selling proposition”: gays would have to learn humility and thus responsibility after they no longer had straights to pretend were persecuting them all the time.) That’d be the next logical “get”.

Tell me of another country where a black kid from the hood who uses deplorable English and profane language, who demeans women, who calls for violence against the police, and who wears his pants down below his butt and raps about how racist America sucks for blacks can become a gazillionaire, critically acclaimed by sycophant whites in the music industry.

France, Japan and the UK. Just off the top of my head. In Japan your English can be straight-up incomprehensible and they’ll still love you.

I really don’t get why people are so convinced by anecdotal evidence. Rap is popular, and some rappers are really, really rich, so clearly there’s no systemic racism in America.

Limbaugh read from the post on his radio show and talked extensively about the meaning of the episode. After reading the line about the “persecution of blacks in America,” Limbaugh said, “What persecution would that be? Persecution of blacks in America. What are we talking — affirmative action? What is this persecution that’s going on?”

Had some cured brisket hanging out in teh fridge fer a wile. Made ribs on Sunday. So memorial day dinner was corned beef, cabbage, potates. Fab it Was not was. So tonight it’s Reubens. Omnomnom. Cole slaw, homemade chips, yada &c.

All this talk about Rudy’s horrible past puts me in mind of a profile I once wrote on his courage. I present it without further commentary.

Profiles in Courage: Rudolf G.

Rudolf, 38, never thought he’d be where he is today. “I’m not planning to keep this job for much longer,” he said, confirming rumors on Capitol Hill that he was looking to get back into the thick of litigation back home in New York. “But the fact I have it at all is a testament to how far you can get in America.”

Rudolf is already Associate Attorney-General, and has under his belt victories such as the deportation of several thousand traitors against our ally “Baby Doc” Duvalier. We asked him about this case, and the day after the interview, he had his secretary fax us his full answer: “I’m proud to have been of use to the President in upholding the rule of law, and I’m sure it’ll be a feather in my cap for the rest of my life. I’d be happy if that was what I was remembered for.”

He tried to tell us this when we asked, but he was interrupted. As any “insider” in Washington or New York City can tell you, Rudolf – “Rudy” to his friends – is constantly vomiting.

~=~

It started when he was just a baby. Originally named Benito, his dutifully Catholic mother only renamed him after several confrontations with blackout wardens who found her intense admiration for the Axis puppet ruler disquieting and his swastika-festooned swaddling clothes in poor taste. In the mean, sepia-toned streets of fifties Nassau County, Rudolf swore to himself to come up in the world, resolutely refusing to get dragged into the mafioso skullduggery that made his father enough money to put him in the suburbs. Accordingly, he dutifully prepared to become a priest – the only other profession available to Italians at the time.

But the vomiting boy could hardly even become an altar boy. “Children with this condition have little to contribute to society,” says an expert, who refused to specify exactly what was speculated to be wrong with Mr. G. “I have no idea what it is that makes someone vomit all the time, even from an early age, but probably it’s something evil.”

But Rudolf wouldn’t let Satan’s clawed hand drag him into despair or dependency, as happens to so many other constantly vomiting boys. “I puked on all kinds of guys,” he boasted. “I was only 24 when RFK shook my hand and let me vom on him.”

We can confirm that, and that isn’t the least of it – sources also insist that “Rudy” has vomited on two former mayors of New York and Richard Daley, Barry Goldwater (R-TX), Canadian presidential hopeful Joe Clark, his likely successor Brian Mulroney, and even, rumors have it, new Pope John Paul II. This is in addition to a flood of reports of Mr. G disgorging his stomach on various friends, family members, neighbors, and passers-by of no consequence. “I want to be just like him when I grow up,” declared enthusiastic youth Michael Bloomberg, age 40. “I hear he made on a girl’s chest!”

When it comes to influence, this cheerful sprat is the rule, not the exception. “Everyone looks up to him in the White House,” said a former director of the CIA, under condition of anonymity. “After a really boozy coke party we all compare our pathetic dribblings to the [expletive] waterfall of chunder coming from ol’ Rudy. We all want to measure up to the little guy.” At this point the shrivelled old man did what was obviously a broad impression of the stereotypical mafiosi from “The Godfather”, which we choose not to transcribe out of respect.

“I coulda been a contender,” he concluded, laughing, in his ignorance.

~=~

In his beautifully appointed Beltway office, Rudolf shook our hands one by one and politely turned his head down so his projectile vomit would only hit our shoes. “Sorry about that,” said a nearby tape recorder – we later learned he had a personal secretary whose job it was to play a whole tape of apologies whenever he threw up on people.

“I’m proud of how far I’ve come,” he said, beaming at his desk, its gleaming mahogany just visible under its thick, vomit-smeared clear plastic case. “I’m living proof the American Dream can come,” he said, and then interrupted himself mid-sentence to puke again. “I’m so sorry,” said the tape recorder.

Among Flame’s many modules is one that turns on the internal microphone of an infected machine to secretly record conversations that occur either over Skype or in the computer’s near vicinity; a module that turns Bluetooth-enabled computers into a Bluetooth beacon, which scans for other Bluetooth-enabled devices in the vicinity to siphon names and phone numbers from their contacts folder; and a module that grabs and stores frequent screenshots of activity on the machine, such as instant-messaging and e-mail communications, and sends them via a covert SSL channel to the attackers’ command-and-control servers.

The malware also has a sniffer component that can scan all of the traffic on an infected machine’s local network and collect usernames and password hashes that are transmitted across the network. The attackers appear to use this component to hijack administrative accounts and gain high-level privileges to other machines and parts of the network.

Flame does contain a module named Viper, adding more confusion to the Wiper/Viper issue, but this component is used to transfer stolen data from infected machines to command-and-control servers. News reports out of Iran indicated the Wiper/Viper program that infected the oil ministry was designed to delete large swaths of data from infected systems.

Who else is looking forward to (the moment Donald has finished rolling him from ATM to ATM) finding Romney with his jizz-soaked temple garment wedged up his ass in an abutment, weeping and refusing to swear, a D gilt on his cheek and fresh hanks of his hair torn out in an envious rage?

i pray to god, that he had hurricane strapped his grill as well as appointed it with water wings prior to the onslaught of Beryl. I hope to never hear of such a tragic loss of outdoor cookery again in my life.
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I got out of the boat. It’s not just “slavery was good for you people”. Dude thinks his father almost getting lynched proves how great America is.

Cause, you know, some other white guys helped him. So they were cool, not like those no good Democratic white guys who say they want to prevent racist mistreatment of black people but really want them on the plantation.

This is yet another of those times where I am inclined to wonder how long and how insane the coverage would be had the mistake been made by the Obama campaign. How many days would Rush run with this.

It are thoughts like these that set the mind a goggle.

I do think that typo or not (or [strokes chin pensively] did one of us get on the inside?) is Brilliant. One might argue that from at least the time of the coup that toppled Mosaddegh that we had become The United States of Amercia (pronounced Amer(sh)ia).

I am and have always been a Proud Red Blooded Amercian. Someone needs to set up a Cafe Press operation Stat. Jeffraham!!!
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This seems unlikely. However, he did spend two years in France, conversing with known francophones, maybe eating brie or quiche or escargot, probably wearing a beret the whole time. Who knows what ghastly habits the french may have taught him. Does he enjoy mime? Does he read Balzac? Does he laugh at the comedies of Jerry Lewis? These are important questions and we as American (or Amercian, if you prefer) citizens deserve to know the answers.

btw Pryme, thanks for the link, As soon as my mind wandered to 1953 i knew I had my next blog post. Plus I don’t think i would have ever come up with MANSHARIAN candidate with out your assistance. As always you got a tip o the hat in the first sentence of the post.

Thanks as always for being such a fine riffing partner. But i gotta run, My roomie is moving out today and taking the intrewebs with him(neither one of us could afford it on our own and it is in his name and he’s leaving the state. So I got some hoovering of source materials entertainment and the like ahead of me.

I also happen to be a rather crafty bastard, and have at least plans A, B, C.
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Who else is looking forward to (the moment Donald has finished rolling him from ATM to ATM) finding Romney with his jizz-soaked temple garment wedged up his ass in an abutment, weeping and refusing to swear, a D gilt on his cheek and fresh hanks of his hair torn out in an envious rage?

whoa, dudes…one of the dialysis nurses just came over and told me that she caught one of their male patients stealing some of my office supplies and whatnot on monday when i wasn’t here…it was stuff like photo paper and scrapbooking things…how weird is that? dude def has a problems…i’ve heard rumors that he’s a bit sticky-fingered, but now i know it’s true…this also explains who stole some of our tournament golf balls a year or so ago…

I think, though, that a “New Republic/New Clopping Republic” photoshop would be hilarious. It’s funny to think of Doughbob tossing the Time magazine aside, and rubbing one out to “My Little Pony” porn.

Ton Clancy has one of his sock-puppet black characters say it, too. This is the first time I’ve seen it from a black man, though. That takes a special kind of Stockholm sufferer.

I used to read a ton of Tom Clancy as a teenager (hey, don’t judge). When did that happen? I’m assuming you mean Robby (Samuel L. Jackson in the movies), as that was pretty much the only Token Black Guy, but I don’t remember that moment…

ahahaha! thanks for that link, pup…here’s a few of the best comments from over there:

the recycled smart-assed letter (originally sent to dr. laura):

Dear Pastor Knapp,

Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God’s law. I have learned a great deal from you, and I try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind him that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some of the specific laws and how to best follow them.1. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord (Lev. 1:9). The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. How should I deal with this?2. I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as it suggests in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness (Lev. 15:19-24). The problem is, how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense.4. Lev. 25:44 states that I may buy slaves from the nations that are around us. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans but not Canadians. Can you clarify?5. I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself?6. A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination (Lev. 10:10), it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don’t agree. Can you settle this?7. Lev. 20:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear prescription glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle room here?I know you have studied these things extensively, so I am confident you can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God’s word is eternal and unchanging.

the witty and urbane…

Very well. Let’s have some doctrinal consistency, then.

In addition to homosexuals, the government should also kill rebellious children (Deuteronomy 21:18-21) and women with no proof of their virginity (Deuteronomy 22:13-20). They should also kill everyone that lives in a town that has a house of worship that isn’t a church and then raze those towns to rubble (Deuteronomy 13:13-17).

I would assume all this would come with a tax hike. Bullets, bombs, and missiles don’t pay for themselves you know.

and the freakout…

Collapse Expand Here’s where I’m totally fucking confused when it comes to ORGANIZED RELIGION (Churches)…. According to “THEIR” Bible, Jesus Christ was the New Sacrament…. so
why the hell are they still demanding their parishioners follow ANY RULE or LAW that comes from the – Old Testament????

If they had their head out of the asses, they’d remember that when they read “CHRIST” answering, after being asked – Teacher, WHICH?? Commandment is the MOST IMPORTANT??? Of course referring to the 10… In answering he states that all of them are important, BUT there are 2 that are even more important than those.. 1.) Love the Lord God, with all your heart and soul, and second ONLY TO THE FIRST (so it’s MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE 10) 1.) LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF….

IT DOESN’T SAY – “Only if they’re straight”, “Only if they have brown hair”, “Only if they speak the same language as you”, or “Only if they believe the same things you do”.. BUT IT SAYS – AS YOURSELF!!! So, SIMPLY PUT – IF YOU HATE “ANYONE”, THEN YOU OBVIOUSLY HATE YOURSELF!!!

So Pastor Knapp…. and all you other EGOMANIACAL Pastors…. Read & UNDERSTAND the BOOK you’re supposed to be TEACHING FROM!!! Holy Shit?!?!?!

Saw that Sauber vid this morning. I too was hoping to see more of the engine and gearbox.

Yeah, that would’ve been nice, but I was surprised to see as much detail as they did show. They usually keep all this stuff top secret, even on an older chassis like that. I also liked that the crew did this all voluntarily in their spare time.

“Maryland Pastor says his ‘flesh’ likes the idea of killing gays. Dennis Leatherman shouts, ‘Kill them all. Right? I will be very honest with you. My flesh kind of likes that idea. But it grieves the Holy Spirit. It violates Scripture.'”

I recall that song “Boy named Sue” and how the naming served a purpose. This pastor has a “Boy named Leatherman” problem, and he’s fightin’ mad about it!

Tell me of another country where a black kid from the hood who uses deplorable English and profane language, who demeans women, who calls for violence against the police, and who wears his pants down below his butt and raps about how racist America sucks for blacks can become a gazillionaire

Tell me of another country where a white kid with no discernible skills whatsoever can be catapulted to the very heights of socioeconomic and political power and hire an army of barely literate racists to complain day and night about talented black musicians finding their only open entertainment outlets in a white-bastardized version of their invented genre…

And not because that’s depressing, but because they think anyone who uses “bad” language while having melanin (c’mon darkies, if you lightened your skin, gained a thousand pounds and had a radio station, we’d suddenly love your foul mouths and “harmless jokes” about women) should never have any outlet for advancement at all.

That was awesome! Thanks! Bookmarked! Knowing that there are a few Motorcycle enthusiasts afoot, I was reminded of an old tale whhile helping my roomie pack his U-haul.

Have you ever had a friend, a bit of a scamp who at one time or another you marveled that he still had all of his teeth? A quick witted little bastard who might exploit any weakness in the service of a gag, who was always looking for an angle, managing occasionally take one two par and really piss someone off, yet manage to get away unscathed? i am proud to say that one such as he, was a very good friend of mine (we quickly learned to leave each other alone for the most part what with mutually assured destruction a definite possibility. not that we shied from opportunities that presented themselves.

About 4 years after he had been married, he got a Job in Richmond Va. and had to leave before he could pack up his things, so he asked me if I would manage the job and then help his wife (also a dear fried) drive the truck the 1200 miles to their new home. “hell yes” I said. A couple of days later he was gone and I was assisting with finishing up the packing and the loading of the 24 foot Ryder. My friend still has the BMW R75 that we brought him, and at the time made it very clear that i should do everything in my power to make sure that that bike made it on the truck (it was just turning springtime here, and would definitely be springtime in Richmond when we arrived.

During the day prior to load in while we were finishing what still needed to be packed and setting up a staging area for the load in. Now my buddy and I had worked as mechanics in a bikeshop together for about 5 years, and we had both worked on the finish line construction crew for the Tour Dupont Bicycle stage race. I became something of a legend when it came to packing up the trucks, both in terms of use of space, and order of load in so that we could load out exactly what was needed in the most efficient fashion. it usually took a couple of days to get it perfected as the kit would change from year to year, or the trucks would have different dimensions, etc. He knew that there was a real chance that his R75 might be a bridge too far, but that if there was anyone who could pull it of, it would be yours truly. Near the end of finishing up the preparations for the load in the following day, I just wanted to get his wife’s temperature on a gag that had come to mind (I still owed him one, and this might very well be my last chance to cash that check). She understood, and was quite happy to play along.

I spent a couple hours before sleep going over the best layout and satisfied with the game plan went to sleep.

Got to the house at about 7:30 am, talked to my traveling partner, and she was even more enthusiastic about the gag.

The very first thing that went into the truck was the R75, then some shipping blankets were placed for protection as well as some cardboard from a refrigerator box served a dual purpose of protection and illusion. We then started loading the first course and when we finished we examined our work and realized that once we got to this same spot in the truck in Richmond, that nobody could have possibly thought that given the remaining space that a motorcycle could possibly remain. We finished packing up ending up with very little room to spare (the rat bastards suspicions had been correct). She said her goodbyes, and we were on our way.

Once on the road officially, we started discussing the acting job that it was gonna take to pull off the gag, and for the next couple of hours one or the other of us woudl suddenly burst out in laughter as we played unpacking day through our heads. A little past halfway, we stopped and got a couple of rooms and crashed with smiles on our faces.

We got up ealy the next day and 4 hours later pulled up inot the driveway my buddy was on his way home from work and his wife showed me around the place while we made our final preparations to get into character. over coffee. I hear the front door open his wife leaves to greet him and brings him into the kitchen. After exchanging hugs and asking how the trip was, he got right down to busines,”so were you able to get the motorcycle in there?” As i was prepared for this I dropped my head a bit and shook it slowly from side to side, “Sorry man, I tried, I really tried. There is a thoeretical possibilty that another day might have made a difference, but, you know.” during my explanation I could see that he had shot a glance at his wife hoping that she would offer him hope, and my god she was a trouper.

So we then go out to the truck i open it, he can see that it is florr to cieling with barely 8 inches to spare, and for the first time, i realize that we might be able to pull this one off. During the next 4 hours it is all his wife and I can do to keep our masks of solemnity, because he keeps needling us about the bike (suspicious of course that I might be punking him). Occasionally when she and I have a chance to catch each others eye, when we know he cannot see us we allow ourselves a quick grin.

When we get to the first course and he examines the remaining space, carries the one, and rightfully concludes that there is no way in hell that his bike is in the truck i realize that we have pulled it off. i make sure that he grabs the last two boxes, putting his hands within six inches of his bike and I follow him out with the box that unveils the package.

We wait for him to return to the truck and sit at the end waiting for the reaction. He goes nuts with a mixture of extreme happiness alloyed with a timy bit of (“i can’t believe i got punked”) We exchange high fives and let loose a torrent of laghter that had been dammed up all day…After picking myself off of the front lawn, I join him in the truck to remove the final obstacle to his happiness, help him get it down the ramp and within a minute he is turning a corner a block around the ftreet.

The missus and I share hugs high fives and more laughter as he roll up with a shit eating grin and says “Thanks guys, you really got me.

True story, every last bit. In normal circumstance while i certainly appreciate a good gag, i don’t have the energy to be constantly on the lookout for reprisal, but like I said, I owed him and i cashed that check.
🙂
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Thanks for the hints re: saws and laser cutting. Try cutting through the titanium, reinforced steel and carbon parts of an F1 gearbox… Successful? Give us a call? 😉

The last of a comment from one of the Sauber moter sport guys. I went looking to see if I could find the “helpful” comment but I don’t wase very deeply into Youtube comments. I do however like the cut of his jab.
.:)
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I heartily disliked Sin City. If I had been familiar with Frank Miller’s work, I’m sure I wouldn’t have ordered it in the first place; I detest violence porn. But the stylized b-&-w production with splashes of color seemed intriguing–I like noir–and I was attracted by the cast. One of my few negative ratings on Netflix.

For 4 months the battle raged on Bataan. Bullets and bombs did little to the American G.I.’s compared to disease and starvation. The soldiers would catch dogs, cats, monkeys, slugs, rats…anything to eat. The locals taught them how to prepare hound haggis. Hibbs recalled, “It was a custom to eat the stomach of a dog that had been gorged with rice before sacrificing it. The warm rice mixed with the mucus of the stomach was supposedly a delicacy.”

I kifed the above from some blog. Reading Ghost Soldiers I ran across that passage and looked for a place where I could c’n’p someone else’s transcription.

I used to read a ton of Tom Clancy as a teenager (hey, don’t judge). When did that happen? I’m assuming you mean Robby (Samuel L. Jackson in the movies), as that was pretty much the only Token Black Guy, but I don’t remember that moment…

No judging here. From context I believe I am at least 15 years older than you, but we gave up Clancy around the same time. My shame awards yours.

The incident was in Executive Orders. Clark and Chavez are flying all over Africa, trying to find the source of the weaponized Ebola. The station chief in Mumble, who took the key picture, is a black man, who tells Clark “You know, I’m kinda glad my ancestors got kidnapped out of this shithole” or words to that effect.

It was a thing Clancy did. He’d have female characters say nasty things about feminism, black characters say nasty things about the Black Panthers…Basically, he had “diversity”, but all his “diverse” characters held the same patriarchal, white supremacist views as Clancy.

Shorter: If Lloyd Marcus didn’t already exist, Clancy would have had to invent him.

OK. It says “awards” up there where it should say “dwarfs”. I don’t know how to scroll up in the edit box on my phone, so I can’t fix it.

Basically, he had “diversity”, but all his “diverse” characters held the same patriarchal, white supremacist views as Clancy.

An excellent trick. I first encountered it when I half-understandingly read the obsolete-in-place Rising Sun and had to wonder, innocent though I was, whether the Japanese really thought so poorly of themselves.

That being said, it somehow stands as an improvement over Heinlein etc, whose characters were literally unidentifiable in the first particular as anything but white American men but sprinkled in for the less sneaky, evil purpose of verisimilitude. Boo! Hash top conservatives on twitter! Boooooooooo!

I actually only read one, and there was an older small-breasted lady and the large-breasted daughter, so something for everyone I suppose. There was even a scene where the two naked ladies compared and discussed (in a hot tub, I believe) how envious each was of the other’s body. I rolled my eyes so hard I’m surprised they didn’t come loose.

It was indeed “The Number of the Beast” and quite put me off reading anything else. I suppose some other stuff might be better, but the way he wrote people and sex in that were just so shallow it made me doubt his ability to understand human beings or sex at all. I got the same feeling from Rudy Rucker, though I read 3 or 4 of his before the desire to push him off a cliff became too strong.

There was even a scene where the two naked ladies compared and discussed (in a hot tub, I believe) how envious each was of the other’s body.

What, you never had little dolls or lego people or army men or even books with human figures on the cover you could mash together and make believe they were having sex? Because my theory is Heinlein sure didn’t. Not even one fake fire truck to hump another like a bright red box tortoise. A sad case, but an avoidable one.

Incidentally, while we’re on old dead people SF, I’d like to share an experience I had: a couple of years ago I was reading this really miserably turgid golden age collection by I forget who (I think one of the editors was Drake? Flint? One of those guys with porn names), and there were exactly three real pleasures in it: “A Gun for Dinosaur” (enjoyably self-conscious schlock), “Shambleau” (which couldn’t help but read differently from the hideously turgid sexplorations of various space-captains, considering the author) and “The Last Question”.

Asimov was by no means perfect, but it took reading twenty-plus stories by his contemporaries to really appreciate his light touch, sense of humor, and approachable prose. It doesn’t hurt that it was right after a story which identically had the same premise but wasn’t a tenth as interesting or funny.

And if memory serves, I persevered until a story about how only old soldiers would understand the duty and honor of future intelligent war machines got me so angry-bored that I shut down my browser in limp fury. (The worst kind of fury.) I tried, though – O Lord, did I try.

There was a discussion of Frank Miller while I was away, and, as a major comic book geek, I have some…opinions on the man and his work.

Frank Miller is in many ways a genius. He’s made some of the best, most influential comics in the history of the medium. He’s made innovations to comics that have forever changed the ways they’ve since been created, consumed and understood. He’s shown a mastery of the craft that few have come close to, much less matched.

He’s also batshit insane. His tics were always there, even in his earlier masterpieces. He’s got serious issues with women. I actually have nothing against prostitutes, but it’s hard to look at a writer who seems to make almost every female character under his pen into a hooker or a victim or both without raising an eyebrow. Like I said, this shows up even his his greatest works. Batman Year One, a brilliant story that helped define Batman as he is today, rewrote Catwoman’s history so that she started out as a prostitute. The man simply can’t help himself.

His recent works have become so infested with his unpleasant mannerisms that any redeeming features are difficult to impossible to find. I haven’t read his Holy Terror book but, by all accounts, it’s a racist, Islamophobic propaganda screed. It was initially conceived as starring Batman, so I thank Grodd that DC had the good taste to pass on that (and DC doesn’t have a lot of good taste in general, so we really dodged a bullet there).

He’s also had a problem, all throughout his career, of always going back to the same old well with his aging, hypermasculine heroes and their gritty and repetitive narration. It gets old, Frank.

To close this off, this is my favourite thing written about Miller’s habits.

That sounds right. I checked out early, because I’ve heard tell if you camouflage semen properly it’s literally impossible to see it coming (the author, I mean) and that just seems unsanitary.

He’s also had a problem, all throughout his career, of always going back to the same old well with his aging, hypermasculine heroes and their gritty and repetitive narration. It gets old, Frank.

You know how my theory about Heinlein is a lack of primitive masturbatory stimulation as a youth? Well, the story is the same with Frank Miller, except instead of nothing he had just one (1) thing to serve as starter capital for his spank bank: a Tijuana bible starring Dick Tracy. The rest, as they say, is history.

B4, I hate to “uh, actually” you, but Bob Kane, the co-creator of Batman, and Bil Keane, the creator of Family Circus, were in no way the same person. Unless that was a joke I’m not getting.

Also, as M. Bouffant pointed out, Bill Finger deserves a lot (or even most) of the credit for creating Batman. Bob Kane, in a massive dick move, screwed Finger out of getting any credit or royalties. One of many extremely shitty things Kane did over the course of his career.

‘Shambleau:” Good story, gotta figure the “hero’s” name, Northwest Smith, was some sort of inspiration for Indiana Jones.

It tells me all I need to know about C.L. Moore that one of the seeds of her early work was the title “Northwest of Mars” and that she found it hilarious. (To assume it of most people in the weird fiction genre would be paying them too high a compliment.)

I always kind of suspected Frank Miller in the inconvenient way nerds who wander onto other nerds’ reservations suspect their wingnutty idols (who totally used to be good back in the day! I swear he used to be so intelligent, and funny, and Batman!), and I was pleased in my usual smug, useless manner to find my suspicions confirmed. Especially this part:

In the name of decency, go home to your parents, you losers. Go back to your mommas’ basements and play with your Lords Of Warcraft.

(Real men play EVE Online, see.) (Seriously, just typing that gave me a huge erection. You would not believe.)

That part had me convinced that he’s trying too hard to be a badass, and failing- like I wrote then, he can still feel the cold metal of the locker interior now, and he needs to overcompensate with some ill-advised nerd-punching.

I mean, fuck, even his grandmother has heard of WoW. It would be like making a crack about the loosers (sic) playing Nasty Birds.

I can’t imagine what a “facebook” might be outside of a police ID thang.

Fenwick: It’s that, if you imagine the criminals themselves posting the pictures, plus all of the vapid celebrity worship, inane games, shameless self indulgence and ill advised sharing of personal issues you can imagine.

I forgive Asimov a hell of a lot just for this: “violence is the last refuge of the incompetent”

I think it should read “violence is the preferred refuge of the incompetent”

d’oh…i just paid 6.50 amercian dollars for possibly the worst taco salad ever…and it was from one of our nicer eating establishments…from now on, i will only order the ones from the crackhouse across the border…

“White children, in the main, and whether they are rich or poor, grow up with a grasp of reality so feeble that they can very accurately be described as deluded – about themselves and about the world they live in. White people have managed to get through entire lifetimes in this euphoric state, but black people have not been so lucky: a black man who sees the world the way John Wayne, for example, sees it would not be an eccentric patriot, but a raving maniac. … People who cling to their delusions find it difficult, if not impossible, to learn anything worth learning: a people under the necessity of creating themselves must examine everything, and soak up learning the way the roots of a tree soak up water. As people still held in bondage must believe that “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make ye free.” – James Baldwin, No Name in the Street